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Roger Goodell: Modern Day American Tyrant

Unless you are one of the select few that own an NFL
franchise, Roger Goodell has no use for you.

If you are a football player, he does not care if you die at
45.

If you are a fan, he does not care what you think.

If you are an American, he does not care if your taxes go
up.

Yes, Roger Goodell hates America.

This is not hyperbole – this is fact, as you’ll see below.
While the Occupy Wall Street movement took on Wall Street and other leaders of
industry, Goodell got a pass. While outrageous executive pay is scrutinized in
all sectors, Goodell gets a pass. While Bud Selig was dragged to Washington,
D.C. to answer for the drug sins of his players, Goodell gets to celebrate a
Super Bowl that will be played with multiple drug offenders. He’ll get a pass.

And that, in short, is the problem. Roger Goodell will get a
pass because he always gets a pass. Like any self-respecting tyrant, he has
insulted himself to the point where there are no challengers.

The NFL is too
big to fail because it means too much to too many. There is an army of
folks – any good tyrant needs an army – whose livelihoods depend on protecting
the shield. I’m not talking about just the players and coaches. There are thousands
upon thousands of men and women who make a living because of the NFL.

The reporters. The announcers. The camera men. The analysts.
The production teams. The advertising folks. On and on the list goes – every single
person who works at the NFL Network to nearly everyone at ESPN.

With that type of protection, who cares what anyone thinks?
Any opposition is snuffed out before it can gain any momentum.

In any other line of business, competition is encouraged.
Where would personal computers be without Steve Jobs refusing to lay down to
Microsoft? What if no one else but Henry Ford built an automobile? What if only
MGM made movies? What if only ESPN televised sports?

Monopolies
are bad for America. In fact, they are illegal in America. Yet on Sunday,
we will gather around the television and pay homage to America’s most valuable
and prominent monopoly. Even the mere mention of an NFL competitor is met with
derisive laughter.

Like a North Korean election, there is no choice on Sunday.
You watch
the Super Bowl, or you watch nothing.

But Roger Goodell hates you, each and every one of you. Here’s
why:

Obstructing Billions
of Dollars and Millions of Jobs from Americans

How much money is bet on football in a given year? The
number is almost impossible to determine because the NFL has led a crusade
against sports gambling since its formation.

It is believed that Nevada could account for 1-5% of all
sports gambling in the United States. Is football gambling a $50 billion
industry in this country? $100 billion? And that’s just for football – could sports
gambling in total be worth $500 billion?

The numbers belie the true point – the American economy
needs help. It needs job. It needs revenue. And yet every year, those billions
upon billions of dollars go to the underground and offshore gaming houses.

Why? Because Roger Goodell hates America.

I have yet to figure out a legit reason why the NFL still
opposes legal sports gambling when it is legal in Nevada and the sport hasn’t
died. The NFL doesn’t hide from gambling – fantasy football is another billion-dollar
industry with weekly shows devoted to it on seemingly every cable network.

Yet when New Jersey took the lead and tried
to legalize sports gambling – estimating that it would add instantly $100
million to its tax rolls in year 1 – the NFL put its foot down. Yes, the NBA,
MLB and NHL* joined in, but the NFL was driving the bus and you don’t mess with
the NFL.

*Why would the NHL be
against sports gambling? Shouldn’t they be begging for any sort of additional
attention to its sports? Besides, who the hell would bet on hockey?

The NFL’s only argument against is the sanctity of the game
and the same “protecting the shield” bullshit they like to trot out to defend
inane policies. Remember, gambling on the NFL is already legal in Nevada and
they would be the ones who would discover any discrepancies in betting that
would lead to game-fixing.

We’ve seen in Europe that the match-fixing scandals in
tennis and soccer have been uncovered by the gaming houses, essentially those
leagues’ best ally in curbing it. Have the betting houses on street corners in
London somehow ruined soccer?

Instead, Goodell and company have hunkered down in a
position that is diametrically opposed to what this country needs. Imagine a
world where sports gambling is legal. Think of the added tax revenues to states
and how that could help alleviate desperate budget shortfalls. Think of the added
jobs, which would reduce unemployment rolls and stimulate the economy.

If Goodell pulled his objection, sports gambling would be
legal in this country. But he will not.

No one will fight the NFL on this. It’s criminal, which is
par for the course for Roger Goodell.

Oh how I have waited to use that as a lede! And it is so
very, very appropriate.

During the first week of the NFL Playoffs, Goodell and
company exemplified the definition of extortion to the letter. They threatened
three cities – Green Bay, Indianapolis and Cincinnati – with the lack of
local television coverage for a playoff football game unless every ticket was
sold. Yes, games played in three stadiums built and/or renovated with taxpayer
money were going to be blacked out unless the taxpayers paid more money.

This is extortion!

Yet all week on ESPN and other media outlets, that word was
never uttered, not even once. In fact, most of the discussion centered about
the heartache and tragedy – yes, I heard the word “tragedy” used for unsold football
tickets – of a Green Bay home game being blacked out. Nevermind it was going to
be one of the coldest games in NFL history, nevermind that the NFL clears 9
figures from television for every playoff game, those 5,000 seats needed to be
sold!

It is still extortion. And it worked. The tickets were sold.
The games were televised. Everyone moved on with their lives.

The NFL is a monopoly that extorts taxpayers and no one
gives a shit. It’s an amazing racket.

Holding cities hostage for ticket ransom is nothing compared
to the money cities have to fork over to build coliseums of sport for
billionaires. Minnesota is the latest
city to be swindled, with the state chipping in nearly $400 million and the
city forking over $150 million. And the club still wants more! Here’s a quote
that Deadspin
so aptly pointed out:

"We only have
$975 million in the budget, and there's only so many things you can get under
that number," said Vikings Vice President Lester Bagley.

There will never be an NFL team in Los Angeles – there will
be one in London before that. Why? Because that is the NFL’s leverage against a
city like Minneapolis when it plays hardball. You either give us money or we’re
moving your football team.

Extortion? Just another day in the office for Roger Goodell.

Free Player
Development, Shifting Blame to Universities

If you’re a qualified 18 year old in America, you can be
employed by anybody. You can vote. You can die for your country. You can play
professional hockey, baseball and basketball.

You cannot play professional football.

Yes, Jadeveon Clowney was more than ready to make millions
in the NFL as an 18 year old freak of nature. Yet the only professional
football league in the country said he couldn’t.

While every other sport in the world – literally, every
single one – employs a minor league system to develop talent, the NFL relies on
colleges to develop talent. Even the NBA, which could similarly rely solely on
colleges, has developed the D-League for young talent, instead of forcing
athletes to spend three years making zero dollars.

While colleges get hammered for not paying athletes, the NFL
is absolved from using it – at zero cost – as a veritable scouting service.
Even when Big Ten commissioner Jim Delany suggested
the NFL create its own minor league, he was lambasted in the press.

People like Delany and other college commissioners – despite
the recent news of a player union for college players – recognize the cognitive
dissonance between what athletes get and what they receive. In fact, the rumblings
of a Division 4 started because the revenue-generating goliaths like the
Big Ten and SEC wanted to give their players more money, the full cost of
attendance.

The NCAA, as they are want to do, have blocked moves like
this through its own protecting the shield-like bureaucracy. Throughout this
entire discussion on football players being played, no one has brought up the
major reason for this – the NFL’s rules against players entering the draft
before being three years removed from college.

So the NFL profits off of a system for which it pays zero,
while the colleges and universities act as its minor league. This is not to say
the NCAA is absolved of blame – Lord knows
it’s a farce of an institution as well – but the NFL skates by with nary a
mention.

In fact, there were many who believed, quite rightly, that
Clowney should
have not played last season for South Carolina because it would do him no
good. As a sure-fire top 5 pick, only bad things could happen to Clowney if,
and when, he played.

When the best option for the best college football player in
the country is to not play football, something is wrong.

Do you think Roger Goodell cares one bit about Jadeveon
Clowney’s future?

The Death of Players
Yields No Significant Changes

Pro wrestling in 2014 looks a lot different than pro
wrestling in 2004. Why? Because the fans and media were sick and tired of their
favorite stars dying young. Due to a combination of drugs, overwork and head
injuries, a slew of pro wrestlers died in the early to mid-2000’s, culminating
in 2007 when Chris Benoit murdered his wife and his son before taking his own
life.

While the mainstream media latched onto the tried and true “wrestlers
take steroids!” angle, the real story came when months later when it was
revealed he
suffered from chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE). Benoit’s brain was
destroyed by wrestling.

Whether you like or dislike the WWE’s current storyline
direction – I’m definitely
the latter – you cannot argue the company hasn't taken great strides in
protecting their performer’s health. There are no more chairshots to the head.
There are no more piledrivers or other unnecessarily dangerous moves that could
cause head or neck trauma. There are honest to goodness drug tests. There are
real concussion tests – just this month, white-hot Daniel Bryan was kept away
from the ring due to one.

In pro wrestling, these cases caused mainstream media outcry
and a demand from fans that changes happens or they will stop watching – as many
viewers tune out the WWE in 2007 after Benoit.

In the NFL, these cases are causally mentioned, if at all.
Ratings are going up. Fans don’t care – they don’t care if a football player
dies at 45. Since they don’t, Roger Goodell doesn’t. And with the
above-mentioned army of media depending on the NFL for a salary, they don’t
dare upset the apple cart.

“League of Denial,” the PBS Frontline special on the NFL and
concussions, was a damning account of the NFL in its 21st century role as Big
Tobacco. They knew. They knew for 20 years what concussions could do. They did
nothing.

ESPN pulled their support from the documentary, obviously
influenced by Goodell. Imagine if ESPN, the most popular sports media outfit on
Earth, ran that documentary on its airwaves. Instead, the show went largely
unwatched, drawing
only 2.2 million viewers.

Goodell has done little, if anything, to prevent future CTE
diagnoses. The concussion policy remains a joke. While college football
instituted a radical new and innovative “targeting
rule” penalty, the NFL instituted rules that are uneven and lead only to
calls of “this is flag football!”

There have been no safety improvements, no changes to the
uniform or the padding players wear on a weekly basis – nothing but lip
service. One of the most interesting parts in League of Denial is when Bob
Schieffer, legendary CBS newsman, pressed Goodell during his annual pre-Super
Bowl interview on concussions. Goodell deftly avoided the questions like a
guilty man should.

Schieffer deserves praise for trying. Everyone else deserves
scorn for failing to continue the fight. The bullshit from Goodell’s mouth
about player safety continues unchallenged, despite his insistence on more
regular season and playoff
games.

By failing to institute new rules that properly remove
headshots from the game; the sport has hoodwinked fans into calling for “true”
football and changing the discussion entirely. It’s PR 101 and maybe as a
Communications Director I should be impressed instead of being thoroughly
disgusted.

The NFL Propaganda Machine
Rolls On

Every good tyrant needs a photo op to show he is a man of the
people. So it should come as no surprise that Goodell’s pseudo-PR division,
ESPN, broke the news – through “sources” at first, of course – that he would be
sitting
outside during Super Bowl 48.

It would be comical if it weren’t presented so seriously.
Yes, this news was presented without a trace of irony prior to the
AFC Championship Game.

The propaganda machine will roll forward on Sunday, as Fox
airs a one-hour special produced by the NFL about why America loves football,
featuring celebrities and former players talking about how much they love the
game and how much the game loves America. I’ll pass on the Joseph Goebbels
comparison, because liking football is so
not that serious but it’s still a solid piece of brain-washing.

Even NFL Films, once used to document the sport, has become
the propaganda arm for the league. Have you watched an NFL Films production
made in the past five years? It is a far and disturbing cry from what it was 30
years ago.

In The End, Nothing
Will Ever Change

I could go on and on, but what’s the point?

The league is swindling the country again by double-charging
for Thursday Night Football – everyone in America pays for the NFL Network for
football games that will now be on broadcast television. This is lauded
by the sports media.

A landmark settlement with former players over concussions
is woefully unfair and struck
down in court. How many times do you think ESPN or Fox will address that
this week?

“[T]he coach weighed
in Wednesday about how this otherwise overachieving organization is dealing
with the issue.”

Those damn, pesky drugs! The Seahawks are in fact, the best
thing ever except for all those stupid drug suspensions that would land Bud
Selig before Congress but merit only one question during Super Bowl week.

I love football. But in the past few years, my attention has
increasingly been focused on the college game as I can’t stomach or tolerate
Roger Goodell anymore.

But I’m still a Jets fan. And I still watch. And that annoys
me.

Without anyone holding the NFL and Goodell accountable,
nothing will change. Players dying hasn’t changed anything. Taking money out of
taxpayer’s pockets – even those that don’t like football – hasn’t changed
anything.

With a monopoly on football in this country and an agreement
with every major American television entity, there is no impetus for change or
challenge.

This article is not good. You've done your research, but the entire premise of the article, "Roger Goodell hates America" is not actually a fact, but a claim. All the stats you use to back that up can be twisted to mean something entirely different if you try hard enough.

You're probably one of those people still trying to vilify Richie Incognito..

"During the first week of the NFL Playoffs, Goodell and company exemplified the definition of extortion to the letter. They threatened three cities – Green Bay, Indianapolis and Cincinnati – with the lack of local television coverage for a playoff football game unless every ticket was sold. " Umm those sre blackout rules that have been around LONG before Goodell not created by! Sean OLeary hates the NFL. there I said it nopw its a fact,correct?

So he's not allowed to remove them? They are a relic of the 1960s when the ticket sales made more than TV. It's 2014. Those games are worth $400 million to TV...the blackout rules don't have to be there anymore.

But your logic scares me as a human being. "It's always been that way so we can't change it!"

Wow, about time someone said what I think! I have not watched a minute (not...one...minute) of NFL football in 5 years. Not a Stupid Bowl, nothing. And I am better for it. I too love football but hate what the NFL is now, because of Roger. All those defending this league are the enablers. These billionaires don't give two craps about you, but you defend them, pay TAXES to them (I sure do here in Minneapolis) and they laugh at you. Whatever, I'll take baseball any day.

The shame is I was the biggest football fan ever growing up and playing it, but it has not been the same in a long, long time now.